La(s) América(s)
Sometimes, it is like dictionaries before the word America. Before we feared ‘isms.’ Truism. Tribalism. Totalitarianism. The ink soils lexicon: Guerra Sucia. Weeped willow root stems of arm-torn. Our thorn.
God is an American! Footnote 1: God is a citizen of the United States. Mark an X on the brown blotches his cross weighs. Banded blue, red, whiten out the New World, Amerigo. One nation, under God - Footnote 2: Under the equator, our hands off the Bible. Border our lines, a child and Crayola in sharp contour.
Other times, we fall in love with soil. With liberty and justice for all. Footnote 3: All north of el Rio Grande, all above the table, all above the poverty line. Outside appliance stores, warm concrete and stench of fresh cement. Flash us swamped colors of midnight. We shine. There are many. Too many of us - Footnote 4: too many unlike us.
They sent us to swim; we float.